Saudi Arabia Is Experimenting With Artillery

In a region full of ostentatious arms shows Saudi Arabia’s latest, being the second outing since 2022, not only gathered the world’s top manufacturers but served as a pageant for homegrown weapons. The pinnacle among them was a self-propelled howitzer utilizing a Tatra 8×8 and developed by SAMI or the state-owned military-industrial holding. The complete system resembled similar efforts found in Asia and Europe where a heavy armament is mounted on an elongated bed supported by a hydraulic stabilizer. The truck’s fully armored cab protects the driver and the operators while rounds and propellant charges are stored in enclosed magazines on the bed.

A fascinating detail about the 155mm system from SAMI were a quartet of inert rounds for the howitzer that were displayed in a row on the truck bed. (See above.) The taller hefty round to the right looked like the US-made M982 Excalibur by Raytheon/RTX that’s capable of reaching targets several dozen kilometers away. The rounds next to it had shapes resembling extended range ammunition and one round (middle, left) having a guidance kit on its fuze. It was never specified if SAMI now has the license to mass-produce complete Excalibur rounds or if the entire munition, including its guidance system, can only be assembled with inputs from Raytheon/RTX and other suppliers. Saudi Arabia’s ground forces, whether it’s the regular army or the national guard, operate a variety of artillery systems including Chinese and French howitzers.

As a holding for different factories Saudi Arabian Military Industries or SAMI continues a long tradition of centralized industrial policy for building the country’s armed strength. This is common enough among Arab states, with Egypt’s Arab Organization for Industrialization (AIO) being a prime example, but lasting success has been hard to come by for others despite earlier progress–the shambles of Iraq’s military-industrial sector endures. Jordan, Qatar, and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) all used the same model of centralized holding companies that have direct control over industrial parks, with varying results. Returning to Saudi Arabia, there’s a half century of efforts at achieving the same, with locally assembled armored vehicles rolling out by the 1990s. With the success of armored vehicle assembly it’s not surprising how a complete artillery system is the next benchmark.

From a regional context Arab militaries have made serious strides adapting and adopting new truck mounted howitzers. An early example was Egypt whose state-owned factories combined armored 6×6 trucks with 122mm and 130mm artillery pieces, which are used in significant numbers by the army. A prototypical 155mm and 105mm truck mounted howitzer emerged from Jordan in the 2010s, however, these never entered service. But necessity compelled Syria’s battered ground forces to introduce their own version with the 130mm M-46 on the bed of an imported truck repurposed for a new role. A few other examples of this improvised artillery system have found their way to Hezbollah in Lebanon. Returning to SAMI’s self-propelled howitzer on a Tatra truck an intriguing clue about its origins is a connection with an ammunition factory established with Rheinmetall Denel during the 2010s. South Africa in particular is a trusted partner of military-industrial sectors for many Arab countries, including Saudi Arabia. The troubled conglomerate Denel once marketed a self-propelled T5-52 howitzer on a similar Tatra truck used by SAMI’s new prototype but its armament was the G5 howitzer.

In the greater West Asia region the introduction of howitzers on wheeled transports has been going on for at least 20 years now. Israel’s efforts are continuous and resulted in profitable exports to friendly countries. The military-industrial sectors of Iran and Türkiye followed the same path yet their results are modest. Turkish manufacturers have at least two 155mm howitzers adapted for wheeled transporters and this selection can still grow in the future. When considering the broader picture of artillery systems in the greater Middle East there’s strong demand for both acquisition and localization and self-propelled models will remain attractive in the long-term.